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BITE Engine

Welcome back adventurers! We've got some awesome news this go-round for not just players, but creators, so keep your eyes peeled.

But before we jump in, if you've ever wanted to see the artistry behind Arcadian Atlas live, soon you can! Becca and I have worked to get a Twitch stream set up where you can watch her live-stream art creation, from maptiles, character design, animation work, and more!

Give her a follow and keep your eyes peeled for her first live stream announcement. For more info & polls on things like preferred stream times, check out her twitter page here.

Introducing: The BITE Engine

Way back when we jumped from RPG Maker to the more expansive world of Unity, we had a vision for not just our dream game, but for a creation tool so user-friendly it could be given to anyone who wanted to make a tactical RPG (one of the most notoriously difficult genres to create).

That dream is beginning to become a reality concurrently with the creation of Arcadian Atlas. Patrick has been hard-at-work on the foundation for what we are dubbing the BITE engine enhancement - an add-on that utilizes Odin Inspector's tools to create easily-modifiable units, scenarios, skills, items, weapons, and scenes. The best part: this tool is being developed in conjunction with Atlas, meaning every benefit to the system is a benefit to the game, which includes the following:

More Power to the Game Designer - A large portion of a game designer's life is turning knobs and whistles to balance values and to create the best possible experience for the player. You've all probably played RPGs with horrid difficulty spikes, or gotten bored going hours without a challenge. BITE allows us to easily and quickly implement your feedback when it comes beta time!

Smaller File and Patch Sizes - To get Arcadian Atlas' prototype off the ground, we initially utilized Unity Prefabs. Moving to a new different segmented form of data means we can be much more efficient with the size of the game, as well as any patches we make on Steam (and elsewhere). We know some of you have internet data caps, so we want to keep file sizes as user-friendly as possible!

Advanced Cutscenes and Scenarios - We've forged a giant pyramid of stats, classes, status effects, and skills out of the prototype's design work so far. Cutscenes and scenarios (missions) rely on pretty much everything, so being clean and organized with those building blocks allows us to quickly create, reorder, and modify events.

Plug & Play Capabilities - We've re-structured the logic and data to separate it from the graphics, which is a fancy way of saying Arcadian Atlas and future tactical RPGs using BITE will require far less digging into code-bases to create and play!

Effortless Changes - With BITE's data-driven design, we can remove, add, and change everything from units, status effects, skills, missions, locations, cutscenes (or most anything else) effortlessly midway through development based on new needs and feedback!

Iconic

To celebrate BITE, we wanted to show off some of the graphics we're paring with Patrick's data-driven systems.

Iconography is an integral part of the user experience, and serves both as localization tool (because images require no translation) and ease of navigation. We love the design challenge of creating icons for our stats, items, text boxes, and menus that are at the same time simple, clean, and communicate efficiently. See below just a handful of those we've cooked up for our items:

Interior Designs & Graphics Galore

And of course behind the scenes we've been hard at work on all the graphics, from animations, items, and some drool-worthy interiors. You'll show yourself outside? Why not show yourself INSIDE you reckless warriors!

This go round Becca has been working up some graphics for house interiors and our Recruitment Centers throughout Arcadia. You can see a few of these below.

And if we zoom in a bit you can see some light pouring through new windows, and bench for troops to sit and wait (because isn't a Recruitment Center just a glorified waiting room), and a fancy desk for processing new troops.

Of course, when you're not waiting, you're training with some quality practice dummies and an assortment of weaponry for our discerning warriors:

And when you're ready to lay your sweet head to rest, we've got a deluxe bed you could probably cram a couple of people in (uncomfortably, but this isn't a charity!) and some barrels full of wine to help the long hours seem short.

Oh, and not zoomed in on is that lil' cactus. Because we might be thrifty interior designers, but we're not animals. Get some greenery in there!

We're also putting finishing touches on our primary attack animations, ensuring all eight frames front and back are as smooth as possible. From the heavy crossbow toting Ranger above, to the gargantuan hammer our Apothecary is dragging around below, we're nearly done with all our CORE classes and their various fightin' styles!

And of course a whole slew of new items for our re-vamped BITE enabled item editors!

Next Time

We're excited to show off some of the interior maps we're working up with these shiny new graphics, the expanded Skill sections of BITE, and lots more art next time! Be sure to check out Becca's Twitch streams and our twitter pages for up-to-the-moment previews and sneak-peaks!

Until then, keep your controllers warm and your bodies cool as we end out this record-setting summer heat!